Liu Cheng did not wait for the butterflies of the eighth month before making his move.
On the twenty-fifth, he received his official documents, seal, and ribbon at Jincheng, and immediately wrote a formal request, sent through his proper superior, Central Army Commander Fan Wang, to the Department of State Affairs, asking that Gao Heng be transferred to serve as Army Provisioning Officer of the Archers Commandant's Unit.
On the twenty-sixth, he called on Chief Registrar Chang Qu, who normally worked on compiling books in the South Garden and occasionally taught at the school, to accompany him to Jincheng. There, he formally entrusted the commandery's affairs to him, while also receiving the Department of State Affairs' approval of Gao Heng's assignment.
That afternoon, he took the half-column Gao Heng had brought over earlier to "hunt pigs" to the barracks west of the Palace City. After settling them in, he met every officer in his unit ranked squad leader or above and invited them to eat duck outside Stone City. That evening, he took the four company Army Commanders, whose titles had a distinctly retro Han and Wei flavor, along with the Chief Clerk and Chief Registrar, to the home of their superior's superior-the Fan Family residence beside the imperial avenue. He even encountered Fan Wang and personally asked him to make suitable arrangements for the former Army Provisioning Officer of the Commandant of Archers' Unit, giving the man a good future.
Who did Fan Wang recognize? He did not know any of this crowd that had squeezed into his house.
Yet he could only nod perfunctorily.
Your son's in my hands anyway. I'm not afraid you'll go back on your word. And so Liu Cheng and the others stayed at Fan Wang's house that night.
On the twenty-seventh, Liu Dage